“I'd like to start a religion. That's where the money is.” L Ron Hubbard
The Church of Scientology began in the year 1953 and is one of the world's newest religions. In this essay I will address three questions: Who was L Ron Hubbard? What is the doctrine of Scientology? How does Scientology qualify as a religion?
Lafayette Ronald Hubbard was born on March 13, 1911 in the town of Tilden, Nebraska and died on January 24, 1986. His nickname growing up was “Flash,” but later in life he was referred to by his initials “LRH.” Since his father was an US naval officer he moved frequently and traveled extensively in Asia and the South Pacific.
Hubbard was admitted to George Washington University in September 1930 to study Civil Engineering. He later claimed to have followed a course of study in nuclear physics graduating with a degree in engineering. He was a very poor student and received grades of mostly “Ds” and “Fs” except for English and physical education. His official George Washington University record indicates that he flunked out in September 1931 and never earned a degree.
Growing up LRH was an avid adventurist. He joined The Explorer's Club in 1940 and was involved in a number of adventures including an expedition to the Aleutian Islands attempting to update the Coast Guard Pilot guide to the coast lines of Alaska. He even claimed to have once roped a Kodiak bear. He was known for telling “tall tales” and was described as someone with an “incorrigible ability to float above the evidence,” a talent that would serve him well as a prolific writer of science fiction and fantasy stories.
The Church of Scientology has a completely different story about just about every aspect of Hubbard's life story. ...
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...ogy survives and flourishes in the same way diets do. As long as people would like to lose weight easily but cannot, there will always be a new promising diet clamoring for their money. And as long as people are frustrated with their lives, careers, or relationships, someone will come forward with the divine secret of happiness and contentment available to those who are willing to believe and spread some silver around.
1. Inside Scientology (2011) by Janet Reitman
2. Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief (2013) by Lawrence Wright
3. Why People Believe Weird Things (1997) by Michael Shermer
Works Cited
1. Inside Scientology (2011) by Janet Reitman
2. Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief (2013) by Lawrence Wright
3. Why People Believe Weird Things (1997) by Michael Shermer
World religions don’t always share features or traits, but a lot of the patterns are similar. All religions have a unique problem and solution, those religions being contested is often an issue, succession from a founder brings changes and eventually, religions typically have an offshoot which seeks to get back to that religions roots. If there’s one positive note to leave off on, which I truly see as hopeful, it’s that maybe, one day, Scientology will see an offshoot which seeks to get it back to its Dianetics roots and reclaim what the movement was, before it took on the shape of a
According to dictionaries a cult is 1) a system of religious worship or ritual. 2) A religion or sect considered extremist of false. 3) Obsessive devotion to a person or principle. It is believed that every cult ties into some kind of religion, and religions all have a common basis of “a leap of faith”. Whether this so-called leap of faith is going to heaven or being reincarnated, or moving on to some other planet, depends on the beliefs of the cult itself.
Schawrtz, L. L. (1979). Religious Cults, the Individual, and the Family. Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, (5), 15–26.
We can distinguish among other religions of such history – Scientology is a complete transformation on a human being. Scientology came about because of Man's increased knowledge of energy (Hubbard, 2007). This movement is a based on the self revelation of the human inner spirit to heal and take on new forms of living. Auditing plays an important role for all Scientologists who learn to believe that our lives need to be controlled in order to develop a higher spirituality. The idea is to confess all of our past endeavors and be cleared path to the "ideal being". The core belief of the religion is that humans are immortal alien beings who have forgotten their true nature. In order to rediscover their inner selves -- the thetans -- Scientologists undergo practices such as auditing (Yapp, 2006). Recognized as a form of technology, the human being is taught to free itself from the barriers and recognize it's true self because of such religious
Cults Each year, hundreds of North Americans join one of the increasing, estimated 3000 unorthodox religions that exist across North America. The increasing number of cults, to date in North America, is due to the fact that cults are a social movement that attempts to help people cope with their perceived problems with social interaction. Cult recruiters target those who perceive themselves as different from the rest of society, and give these individuals the sense of belonging that they crave. Cult literature lures potential cult members by appealing to their desperate need to socially fit in. Cults provide a controlled family environment that appeals to potential cult members because it is a removal from the exterior society.
“A cult is a religious or semi-religious sect whose members are controlled almost entirely by a single individual or by an organization.” (“What”). Families are forced to leave their homes and life behind by a dream that the cult will take them to bigger and better places. Some of these cults also cost these members their lives. There is always that question of why they do it because it is far from believable. These leaders are manipulators dragging in their pray in like flies. Heaven’s Gate is a cult. People don’t just have their mind set and say “I’m going to go join a cult,” they are looking for a safe haven. They have different beliefs and rituals. A religious cult isn’t just a group of people left to their beliefs, but yet it is a threat to our nation and the people in it. “The mind of the fanatic” wants but more so “needs something to worship, even to the point of annihilation.”(Katherine Ramsland).
Mystery cults greatly influenced the development of Pythagoreanism as Pythagoreans adopted many of their traditions, behaviors and beliefs. Pythagoras, the founder of the Pythagoreans, established a school in which he developed and taught these adopted cultural behaviors and beliefs. "The nature of daily living in the school, both its moral and its intellectual disciplines, can perhaps best be understood as an intellectualized development from earlier mystery cults such as the Eleusinian" (Wheelwright 201). The Pythagoreans and the mystery cults were not identical, but they shared many similar beliefs on subjects such as the soul, transmigration and reincarnation, and they practiced many of the traditions of initiation, ritual and secrecy. Pythagoreans combined the mystery cults' views on these subjects with philosophical thought as a foundation to develop their own unique beliefs.
The history of Scientology shows its persistence to keep their members with the promise of spiritual enlightenment. Scientology was founded in the mid-twentieth century by renowned science-fiction author L Ron Hubbard. (Sweeney) The basic foundation of the church stems from the ideas of his best-selling book, Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health. (Anderson) Dianetics was published on May 9, 1950, and the date would become recognized among Scientologists as a religious holiday. Hubbard claimed that the discovery of the science of dianetics is “a milestone for Man comparable to his discovery of fire and superior to his inventions of the wheel and the arch” (Reitman 58). The book’s ideas encourage humanity to rid the individual of any of their mental weaknesses (18). It went on to make its way up the bestseller list by the summer o...
For many years, cult leaders always had a psychological hold on their followers' minds. Whether it was to kill other people or to kill themselves, they did it without question. Some cult leaders used fear, violence and guilt as a means of a weapon to control the minds of their followers. Other cult leaders used persuasive and spiritual speeches that made their followers believe they were doing good and fulfilling God's plan. Because cult leaders are powerful through psychological offenses, the people that belong to their cults are brainwashed into doing things they wouldn't normally do in their right state of mind.
Moreover, by obtaining a basic understanding of Scientology and its purpose we can now explore and uncover the answer to a question that sparks the curiosity of outsiders in western civilization; such a question is How did it Begin? The origins of this culture began in the year of 1923 when L. Ron Hubbard started his studies of the mind and spirit. Likewise, such studies resulted in the creation of a manuscript entitled Excalibur; this book was completed in 1938 but was never published. Furthermore, it was in this unpublished work that the word “Scientology” first appeared. The literal interpretation of the phrase means “the study of knowing how t...
The skeletal facts of his personal struggle for light and of his rise from the coalmines of West Virginia to the summit of academic achievement are great in and of them and can be briefly stated.
Mormonism is a way of life that is practiced by members of the Church of Jesus
Many books have been written that discredit the religion of Scientology including Paulette Cooper's book titled The Scandal of Scientology which outlines all of what she believes to be faults in the Scientology religion. Being a biased source I turned from that book to an article printed four years after the death of the founder of Scientology Lafayette Ronald Hubbard. Titled "The Scientology Story "it was a series in The Los Angeles Times that was written to walk through Scientology from the beginning and simply explain the facts. In this unbiased account of Scientology and L. Ron Hubbard, there are many discrediting facts and ideas about the religion that were found. It is these very facts that I will be listing that many of Scientology's greatest critics use to defend themselves (in the case of those in the medical professions ), or to explain why the religions ideas are simply not valid or untrue.
Scientology was founded in 1952 by L. Ron Hubbard. The Church of Scientology has been known to use manipulations such as isolation and lawsuit to keep members in line. Many consider the Church of Scientology to be a church and not a cult because it is recognized by the IRS, but numerous countries refuse to recognize it as a church including, the United Kingdom, Greece, Canada, Germany, and France. Reverend Sun Myung Moon founded the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity in 1954. After 7 years in the church his followers were told they could choose their marriage partners and he became famous for his mass marriage ceremonies. In 1970s, Moon renamed the cult the Unification Church and relocated it to New York City. The cult still exists even though Moon died in 2010.